Absent Are the Saints
by Virus Vescichetta
Summary: There are no holy men left in a world wiped clean by nuclear fire. Irradiated water doesn't wash your hands clean of sin.
1. Prologue

Pre-story A/N: If I owned Fallout...I don't know. Shit would probably be different. The point is I don't. The title comes from a 36 Crazyfists song. Credit where credit is due, right? Oh, and I hate the summary I have stuck on this thing. Literally took me half an hour to come up with. It's pathetic. I don't rightly know what I'm going to do differently from any other Fallout 3 novelization (I hate that term). Maybe good grammar and realism. Those are pretty rare in any fanfic. One thing I do know is that, like all my stories, it will do its best to earn its M rating. So, you know, be prepared for that. On with the show!

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><p>"You could come with me," it was more than just an offer. It was more than just a request. It was an attempt to hold onto one familiar thing when I went into the world outside the Vault. It was probably horribly obvious that I was terrified to go. I don't think I could rightly be blamed; neither of us knew what lay beyond that door.<p>

For the entirety of our lives, Amata and I had been best friends. She was the one who helped organize and set up my tenth birthday party and I was the one who stuck up for her when Butch and his friends decided to pick on her, though that hadn't happened as much since it had actually come to blows before our GOAT exam. It was the hardest fight of my life, but despite it being three against one they were still the ones who ended up in my father's clinic a few hours later after pain had overridden pride.

That night was also the first time Amata and I had ever had sex. We managed to find some assorted liquors and get ourselves drunk to celebrate the fact that we had both evaded the bullet of being a garbage burner. Most of the night ended up being a blur, but neither of us forgot how we ended up naked and tangled in my bed. I also never figured out exactly where my father was or what he was doing that night since he never answered that question with anything but a knowing smile.

Amata was the one to warn me about her father's men coming to find me after my father left the Vault. I appreciated the thought, especially knowing what might happen to her if her father found out. There was something cold about the Overseer; something that told me he would put what he considered to be his duty before his only family. My fears were confirmed when I found her being interrogated by him and one of his favourite security guards, Steve Mack.

When I saw Mack throw that first punch across Amata's face, something inside of me snapped. There was no warning besides the sound of the door sliding open before a ten millimetre round slammed into the back of his skull. His blood exploded on the wall in a bright red spatter that looked vaguely like a spider. I didn't realize how much of the moment I noticed until later when the sinking feeling of realization that I had just murdered another human being sunk in. Up until that point I had avoided the security guards or, at the worst, knocked them out with a stolen baton. My first kill left a bad taste in my mouth and an empty, sick feeling in my stomach.

Amata ran out of the room behind me, leaving me with my gun trained on the Overseer for a few moments before I ran, too. His lips moved, but whatever he had to say was drowned out by the blood hammering in my ears. I caught up with my childhood friend, made sure she was okay, and then just as quickly bolted for the Overseer's office. I couldn't bear to look her in the eye once I'd realized what I had just done.

For a brief moment Amata actually looked like she was going to say yes. For a brief moment it looked like there might be something good to come out of all of this after all. "I can't," she sounded regretful when she finally spoke. "I want to – I honestly do – but my place is here. If anyone can talk some sense into my father and get him to calm down, it's probably me."

Despite the burning feeling of bile rising in my throat, I nodded. "Yeah, you're right," I conceded. "Someone needs to stay here and make sure things don't get any worse." I tried in vain to swallow the taste of disappointment back down.

I heard muffled voices on the other side of the locked door next to us and knew that several of the Vault's security guards were about make an appearance. I chanced the extra moment it took to wrap my arms around Amata in a hug, something she returned twice as tightly. "Good luck," she wished with a quick kiss on my cheek.

"You, too," I replied hastily before turning and running for the exit. I had just passed through the giant circular hole of the Vault entrance when I heard the door behind me open up. A pair of shots rang out in the air, though judging by the way they harmlessly impacted on the rock around me I assumed they were simply a warning.

I turned around in time so see Amata staring after me with a look of sadness and regret before the Vault door slid back into place with a near-deafening screech of metal on metal. I actually flinched at the heat of the handle on the old, worn door at the far end of the cave. After a deep breath in a fruitless attempt to calm my screaming nerves, I turned the handle and stepped into the light of the unknown.

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><p>AN: So this is something I've had kicking around on my computer for a while and I just never got around to continuing or posting. What can I say? Working on The Line Begins to Blur has gotten my flair for writing back on track. This is probably the shortest thing I've ever written, but I just found it needlessly tedious to try and get into a real first chapter of growing up in the Vault and fighting through bugs to the door. I tried it and it was stupidly boring, so I came up with this brief prologue instead. I have a very vague idea of where I want this to go (emphasis on vague). As we get along, if you'd like to contribute ideas, I'm open to them. Otherwise, reviews are always appreciated. Does that sound like begging? I don't like to beg. It isn't begging.


	2. Chapter 1

The brightness of the light outside was immediately and painfully blinding. To eyes used to artificial lights and grey metal walls, the sun was simply overwhelming. With my eyes blinded shut I was hit by all the other sensations of the Wastes that much harder. Oppressive, suffocating heat soaked into my clothes and skin, instantly making even my scant jumpsuit nigh unbearable. With my first real breath I was assailed by the smell of dust and burnt rock. I coughed a couple times before I got used to the feeling of unbelievably dry air filling my throat and lungs.

I had to blink several times before my vision was clear enough to actually see more than ten feet in front of me, and even then I had to squint. In the distance I saw a large mass of metal that looked vaguely like some of the buildings I'd seen in Pre-War books in the Vault and quickly deduced that it was the town that had been described in the Overseer's computer.

I hopped down the short cliff to the ground below and found it covered in asphalt, again something I was only aware of from surviving Pre-War texts. I figured that if I was lucky the road would lead to the town, or at least close enough for me to find my own way, so I started off along the cracked and broken path.

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><p>"...The main job I was assigned was Pip-Boy programmer, though I also did a lot of basic maintenance and helped my father out around the clinic," I continued explaining to the bright-eyed woman before me. "Performed my first unassisted surgery when I was eighteen, actually."<p>

"You were allowed to perform surgeries?" Moira sounded surprised, but delighted. Everything seemed to delight her, though. She seemed much too happy and energetic for a woman in a post-apocalyptic wasteland.

"Not officially," I admitted with a somewhat sheepish grin. Maybe her good mood was infectious. "It was only a minor surgery. I had to reattach someone's finger after a maintenance accident. Nothing life-threatening, but certainly a test."

She quickly scribbled down some notes while I sipped at a glass of mostly radiation-free water she had given me. I had stumbled into this town – Megaton, as I had learned it was called – and was quickly approached by a man named Lucas Simms. Apparently he was the town's self-appointed sheriff and he felt it was his duty to make sure he talked to most people who came through his town. It seemed terribly unfair, then, that he had missed my father, though he did direct me to a couple places around town where I could learn more.

Knowing that I wasn't going to learn anything immediately, I decided to find somewhere to get some food or drink. I was unprepared, however, for the bitter, metallic taste in the water I had found from a working tap. It also made me feel instantly sick to my stomach and stung painfully at the small cracks forming in the dried skin of my lips. A warning beep and the clicking of an automated Geiger counter in my Pip-Boy told me that the water was highly irradiated, and I swore at myself for not expecting that beforehand.

My search for food had led me to a small shop called Craterside Supply and to the chipper young woman before me, Moira Brown. She immediately recognized the large "101" on the back of my jumpsuit and bombarded me with questions about life in the Vault. For the trouble she gave me another jumpsuit, though this one was covered in a patchwork of armour plates. I scratched idly at the somewhat beat up metal on my chest as we spoke.

"So you mostly did work with computers and basic repairs, but your father taught you medical skills as well?" it seemed a redundant question, but I understood her wanting to be as clear as possible with all the facts.

"Yeah, that's right. Everyone was assigned a job when they turned sixteen based on an aptitude test we were given. Dunno why my dad taught me anything about medicine, though. I guess he just figured I had a knack for it or something."

"Those skills will probably come in handy out in the Wasteland. Most people can't fix themselves when they get hurt, much less other people," Moira smiled in her bright and cheery manner. I would later learn that the sudden surprised, almost confused expression was a sign for me to either leave or prepare myself for something entirely horrible and unpleasant. At the time, however, I simply took it at face value and assumed she'd just had an idea. "Hey! You could help me do some research on a book I'm planning to write!" she smacked the counter in front of me and I held no shame in the fact that I visibly jumped.

"How could I help you with a book?" I asked.

"It's a guide for surviving out in the Wasteland. Since you're going to be out and adventuring, anyway, you could help me by doing some field work," she seemed so positively delighted by the whole idea I found it hard to think of a reason to say no.

"I guess if it'll help people survive out there...but I'm kind of a novice with that, myself," my voice sounded sufficiently unsure, but it didn't damper her mood in the slightest.

"Nonsense. The skills you learned in the Vault have already put you ahead of the average Wastelander, and while you're working on the book you're sure to improve them. So what do you say?"

Looking into those bright, hopeful eyes and seeing how sure she was that what she was asking of me could really help save lives, I found I couldn't refuse. "Alright. Once I've asked around town about my dad I'll help you get started on it," I nodded with a light smile.

"Oh, aren't you just the best!" she looked about ready to run around the counter and hug me. A small part of me didn't find the idea terribly unappealing. "If you want to ask around town about your dad, though, you should probably talk to Colin Moriarty, up at the saloon." She scowled slightly at the man. "Personally, I don't much like the man, but he always seems to know what's going on in town."

"I might just do that," I said and set down my now empty bottle. "Thanks for the water, Moira. It was significantly less painful than what I had our a tap earlier."

"Never a problem," she replied cheerfully. "Come back whenever you have some time to spare and we can start on our book."

I nodded and gave a quick wave as I stepped out the door. My eyes still weren't used to the light from the true sun and I had to squint to keep the light from being too painful. The open air still burned at my throat and filled my mouth with the taste of dust. A rather disheartening thought occurred to me that it would take a long time to get used to life outside of the place I used to call home.

Moriarty's Saloon was at least an easy place to find, considering the huge sign hanging over the doorway to the building. Still, it took me several minutes to navigate my way around the rickety metal catwalks and walkways hanging around the city.

The first sight I was greeted with upon opening the door was the man behind the counter. At least, I assumed it was a man. His skin looked like burnt, dry leather, stretched tightly around little more than bones. His hair looked tattered and ragged and his eyes were sunken and dark. I barely suppressed the urge to jump when he spoke. "Got a problem, smooth-skin?" his voice was hoarse and gravelly and carried a distinctly annoyed tone.

"Uh...not immediately," I answered hesitantly. "If it isn't beyond rude, though, mind if I ask what's um...wrong with you?"

He looked more surprised than anything else. "What, you've never seen a ghoul before?"

"No, actually," I walked slowly over to stand at the counter. "See, I just came from that Vault over there," I gestured over my shoulder "so I don't know much of anything about, well, anything."

"Oh. I didn't know there was even anyone in there," he admitted with a shrug. "Well, I'm a ghoul. Name's Gob."

"Okay, Gob. So...what exactly uh...happened?" I was unsure of how to phrase the question.

To my surprise, he chuckled, a rough and raspy sound. "Radiation happened. You get enough of it without dying, you turn into a ghoul. Your hair falls out, your skin flakes off, and you sound like you smoke a carton of cigarettes a day," he said before a scowl came across his face. "And just cuz you look like a corpse everyone figures they should just treat you like one."

"That hardly seems right," I frowned. "I mean, you didn't choose to get irradiated like that, and it doesn't seem like you're any different from any other person."

This time when he chuckled, a large grin stayed on his face. It made it look like the skin was going to tear apart under the strain, but I held back any signs of how much it unsettled me. The Wasteland was definitely going to take some getting used to.

"Yeah, well, some people can't tell a normal ghoul apart from a feral, I guess. Or maybe they just don't care to," he shrugged.

"Feral?"

"Some of the ghouls who change don't take it too well," he stated blandly. "They go nuts or something, I don't know. Whatever happens to them, they end up attacking anything that isn't another ghoul. I think that most people see one of them and just assume that all ghouls are like that."

"Gob, if you're chatting instead o' working, I'll take the rod to you!" a thick voice called out from behind the ghoul. It carried a heavy accent I couldn't for the life of me place. A middle-aged man walked out of a room at the back of the building, sporting greying messy hair and an equally grey goatee. His look turned from angry to genuinely shocked when he caught sight of me. "Well, fuck me sideways. It's you! The young suckling babe with nary a tit to suckle."

I stared at him with a somewhat dumb expression. "Should I know you?" I asked. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed the ghoul resumed cleaning something behind the bar, clearly trying to make himself as unobservable as possible.

"At the age you were when we last saw each other, I should say not," he laughed. "Last I saw you, you were on your way to that fancy Vault with dear ol' dad. And there was me, Colin Moriarty, giving you two shelter from the world until you did your best to hide from it."

"You must have me mistaken for someone else. I was born in Vault 101," I tried to correct him.

"Is that what James told you?" Moriarty laughed again and shook his head. The fact that he had used my father's name made my throat tighten uncomfortably at the possibility that maybe - just maybe - he was telling the truth. "Oh, the lies we tell to those we love. No, ya weren't born in that hole. You were born up here, just like the rest of us scum o' the Earth."

"There's no way my dad would lie to me about something like that," I said despite the unsettling feeling worming its way into my gut. "Look, I was told that if anyone in this town knew anything about him, it'd be you."

"Oh, aye, I saw him not too long ago," the man nodded. "Stopped in here, grabbed a few things and was off just as quick as he showed up. I was downright offended he didn't want to stay and catch up."

I sighed in relief at the possibility that I might actually get somewhere so easily. "Do you know where he went?"

"Interested in followin' in daddy's footsteps, eh?" Moriarty smirked at me and crossed his arms. "Yeah, I know where he went. And for a hundred caps I'll even tell you."

"Caps?" I asked.

He laughed aloud now, a decidedly cruel sound. "I suppose you don't know how the world works, do you? Caps, my dear boy, are what we use for money here. You know, bottle caps, like the kind off those bottles of cola and the like."

"Well, clearly I don't have any of those," I folded my arms across my chest, effectively mirroring him.

"Well, clearly you aren't gonna learn where your daddy's gone from me, then, until you get some," Moriarty shrugged unconcernedly. "Sorry to say, boy, but that's how it works. Information is a commodity, just like anything else, and commodities cost money." His eyes lit up as a thought suddenly struck him. "How about this: you go take out some thieving bitch named Silver who owes me a mess of caps, and I'll think about telling you what I know."

"Take out?" I gave him a confused look. "Wait, you want me to kill her?" I asked as his intent dawned on me.

Moriarty looked at me like it was obvious. "How else do you expect to get the caps out of her? She's a junkie and a whore; who gives a fuck if she dies?" He spoke with such coldness and disregard for her life I was actually stunned into silence. "Look, you want to find your dad, right? Well this is the best chance you have at finding him. Are you really gonna lose too much sleep if one more little bitch gets swallowed up by the wastes?"

I left the saloon with the information that Silver was in one of the small houses in the ruined town just outside Megaton. I had no intention of killing her; if I could talk the caps out of her, I would. At the very least I had to try.

It was strange, walking out of Megaton followed by nothing but the sound of the giant metal gate to the city grinding shut. A quick glance at the clock on my Pip-Boy told me it was mid-afternoon. Part of me instinctively knew that I should be able to tell that from where the sun was in the sky, but considering I had never seen the sun before it was somewhat difficult to instantly know.

The trip down to the ruined town seemed shorter than it had when I had gone to Megaton from the Vault. The sun burned at my skin less and a gentle breeze kept some of the heat away from me. It also kicked up an unfortunate amount of dust and dirt, but I figured I should probably take the good with the bad.

Finding Silver's house wasn't difficult. After all, it was the only place in the entire town that wasn't either a skeleton of foundation or boarded up. I opened the door and gave it a quick knock as I poked my head inside. "Hell-oh wow," I started when I caught sight of the woman inside. Or, more specifically, the makeshift syringe planted in her arm. It looked like something made from a needle, an extra canister and some thin tubing all held together by tape.

"Who the fuck are you?" Silver screamed and stood up from the chair she was in. She was dressed in nothing but a dirty tank-top and what looked like loose leather pants. The syringe clattered to the table beside her, but I could tell by her eyes that she was already under the effects of whatever drug she had injected herself with.

"I'm here on behalf of Colin Moriarty," I spoke slowly and evenly. Working in a clinic had given me just enough experience with people high off various drugs to know to be cautious. "He seems to believe you have a number of his caps."

"That fucking snake. He couldn't even bother to come out here himself," she snarled. "You go back and you tell him to go to Hell."

"How about you give me the caps, and then I go back and tell him you've been dealt with?" I countered. "He and I get our money and you get your freedom. Everybody wins."

"Fuck you!" she shouted and reached for a revolver sitting on the table.

I would later think that I probably should have just shot her, considering I could have drawn my ten millimetre handgun before she had her own pistol trained on me, but I was still looking to resolve this without anyone dying. In that mindset I just charged and tackled her to the ground. We tumbled over the chair behind her and I ended up in the unenviable position of lying beneath her. She scrambled to her knees and moved to plant her revolver against my skull. I grabbed her wrist and pulled it to the side.

The shot was deafening and my left my ears ringing. My free hand reached to my waist and pulled out the baton I had stolen from Vault security during my escape. I didn't even bother extending it before I slammed it into the side of her head. The blow stunned her and knocked her off, though it also jerked her hand and another shot let out its thunderous report. The adrenaline and the noise tripped something in me. All rational thought left my mind and I reverted to pure instinct.

The black flash of the baton flicked through the air again. And again. And again. My mind didn't register what I was doing until the splash of blood on my face snapped me back to coherence. I stared down at the corpse below me, her once attractive face a broken and bleeding mess. Even in my haze I had known to strike for the side of her head, and it was her temple and cheek that had suffered the worst of the damage. She lay unmoving and lifeless as a pool of blood slowly leaked onto the dirty floor around her head.

"Oh, God..." I dropped the baton as though it was suddenly white-hot and scrambled back until I hit a wall. I held a hand to my mouth as I fought to keep my stomach from emptying itself. The burn of bile in the back of my throat became overwhelming. The metallic smell of blood surrounded and consumed me and I suddenly realized the hand pressed to my face was covered in it. The only thing that kept me from vomiting was the overriding thought that it would be a waste of my body's moisture and nutrients and I could no longer afford that luxury.

"This is your fault!" I screamed at the corpse. "If you hadn't reached for your gun..." I was breathing heavily; desperately. "I wanted to work things out. I didn't want to..." it made it all the more terrifying to try and put it into words.

I shut my eyes and took a deep breath. It was done. She was dead. Now I just had to grab the caps and I could get out of the foul place. It reeked of death and blood.

Clumsy hands roved over her, searching for something. I didn't know what any amount of caps would be kept in. After all, it wasn't as though a couple hundred bottle-caps would fit in a wallet or a change purse. After figuring out that she didn't have them on her person, I set about looking around the house. Within less than a minute my search had yielded a small bag that sounded like a metallic shower when it moved. A quick look inside confirmed my hopes. It was filled with caps from all manner of bottles. Some were whole and circular, others bent or twisted, but they were all definitely caps and I hoped against hope that they would be what I needed.

I paused and looked once more at Silver's bloodied corpse. I distantly realized that the horrible sick feeling in my gut wasn't as bad as when I had killed Steve Mack in the Vault. It had been less than five minutes and already it was all but gone. I wondered if the next time I had to kill someone if it would even be there.

I shook my head and a new feeling of shame and regret planted itself firmly inside me. This was a human life that I had taken, and I was thinking about how much easier it would be the _next_ time. I didn't want there to be a next time. I just wanted to find my dad and...

I abruptly realized I had no idea what would come after finding dad. It wasn't like they'd take us back in at Vault 101. But then he knew that, too. He was the smartest man I'd ever known. He must have had a plan, I decided, and when I found him I'd help him with it, just like I always had.

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><p>AN: It occurs to me that a nineteen year old fresh out of an isolated Vault probably wouldn't be very good at surviving the initial days in the Wasteland. This and the next couple chapters are going to attempt to get across the idea that when he starts out the Lone Wanderer really is a naive kid just looking for his dad and he'll either have to do whatever it takes to survive or get swallowed up by the wastes. Clearly it's a foregone conclusion for which happens, but it's about the journey, not the destination. And this journey is going to end up getting as dark as I can make it, because the world of Fallout is not a bright and shiny one.


	3. Chapter 2

It was well into evening when I got back to the saloon, most of my time during the late afternoon having been spent at a place called the Brass Lantern. It was the only place in town to get food, none of which looked particularly edible and tasted worse, but my empty stomach had decided that looks and taste didn't matter, so long as it got filled.

"Come on, you piece of shit!" Gob growled as he smacked at a radio crackling with static. "Work!"

"It isn't the radio, Gob. Galaxy News has a shit signal right now," the woman standing across the counter from him sighed. She turned at the sound of the door closing and a practised smile painted itself on her face. She was attractive, with soft features, a shapely body and short dark red hair, but there was something about her eyes that looked distressed and somehow lonesome. "Hey there, handsome. If you want something to drink, talk to Gob. If you're looking for some company, it'll cost you a hundred and twenty caps to rent a room and me."

I blinked a couple times and stared at her. A small voice in the back of my mind helpfully supplied the word "prostitute". "No thanks. I'm just here to talk to Moriarty about something," I said after a quick cough.

She shot me a smile and spun around on her heel. "Alright, but if you decide you don't want to sleep cold tonight, I'll be around," she said over her shoulder and walked off.

"To someone who's used to life in a Vault..." I began and turned slowly towards Gob. "...The outside world is kind of...fucked up."

"Kind of?" he laughed in his harsh, raspy voice. "Megaton's one of the calmest places in the Wasteland, kid. If you think this is fucked up, you need to see what's left of DC."

The small voice from before reminded me of dad's lessons on the area around the Vault. In retrospect, it occurred to me how odd it was that he taught me about the Wasteland and the ruins of Washington, DC when none of the other kids my age knew anything and the adults were extremely tight-lipped about it. It was always met with a response of "We live in the Vault and we die in the Vault. There's no need to know."

A creaking door behind Gob brought me out of my reverie. "Silver's dead," I told Moriarty when I saw him walk out of the back. I noticed that the ghoul immediately went back to work cleaning whatever dirty glasses were kicking around the bar.

He chuckled as he walked around the counter to stand before me. "Good. One less junkie out polluting the world," the man actually seemed happy about it.

"So where's my dad?" I asked again.

"I never said I'd tell you for killing her. You still have to pay me," he said with a smirk. "Three hundred caps."

My hands tightened into fists at my sides. "It was one hundred before," I bit through clenched teeth.

"But after taking that bitch's money, I know you're fuckin' loaded now," he shrugged. "Personally, I don't give a fuck if you pay me or not. Silver's dead, so I'm happy. Either you can give me the three hundred and I'll tell you where your dad is, or you can fuck off. Call me if you change your mind," he said and walked into the back room of the saloon.

I barely withheld the urge to scream and curse. It wouldn't do me any good, I knew, so I instead opted to sit down at the bar with a defeated sigh. "Why don't you just pay him the three hundred and get out of here?" Gob asked quietly.

"If I do, I won't have enough money for supplies to even go after him, unless he's just hiding in the town outside," I answered.

The ghoul looked over his shoulder quickly, then leaned in. "Look, you're a good kid and you treat me nice. Nicer than most. In the back there's a terminal where Moriarty keeps all his dirty deals and secrets. Man's a stickler for keeping track of that kind of shit," he whispered hastily. "If you can figure out the password or hack it or something, it'll probably say where your dad went. But if you get caught, you didn't hear this from me."

I looked at him, stunned. "Thank you, Gob," I muttered back.

He sighed and looked around the saloon again. "And don't tell her I told you this, but Nova knows the password. Don't know if you'll be able to get it out of her, though."

I gave him a warm, genuine smile. "Thank you," I said again. "For what it's worth, you don't deserve any of the shit you get given. You're one of the only nice people I've actually met since I left the Vault."

He looked somewhat uncomfortable with the kind words. "Yeah, well, just remember that if it all goes to Hell I didn't tell you a damn thing, smooth-skin," he muttered and went back to his perpetual cleaning.

I stood from my seat at the bar and looked over at the red-haired woman carefully eyeing the saloon. "Changed your mind?" she asked with a sly smile as I walked over.

"Actually, I was wondering if you knew anything about my dad," I said. "Middle-aged guy, people keep on saying he looks kinda like me..."

"Yeah, I saw him a couple days ago. He stopped in for all of ten minutes, said something to Moriarty and then ran off," she explained.

"Any chance you know where he went?" I asked gently. My tone was pleading.

She looked around the saloon again, though this time I could tell it was an effort to avoid looking at me. "I don't know where he went," she said and cleared her throat. "But I know how you can find out. Moriarty has a terminal where he keeps track of every major thing that happens in town, and there's no way he didn't consider your dad coming here major." She looked at the door to the back room uncertainly. "And it just so happens that I might know the password to get into the computer."

I made sure to keep my lips sealed on the fact that I already knew that. "So what's it gonna cost me to find out?" I asked matter-of-factly.

Nova actually smiled slightly. "You catch on quick, kid," she said as she looked me over. "Tell you what. You rent a room for the night and show me a good enough time, I'll tell you what you want to know."

I'm sure the look on my face was priceless. A small part of me was wary of such an offer, but compared to handing over three hundred caps to Moriarty, this deal seemed much more in my favour. "Considering my other options, this certainly does seem like the most beneficial course of action for me."

Her smile widened. "So glad we can agree on this," she said sweetly. "Give me my caps and we'll head up to your room and get started." She spoke of it in a very businesslike manner, like it was just another transaction. I mused that, at the heart of the matter, it really was. I was one more customer for her who happened to be getting more out of the experience than just sex.

"That might take a minute," I chuckled in light embarrassment and gestured to the jingling sack at my waist. "A hundred and twenty is a lot to count out."

"Start keeping them in a bunch of smaller bags. It makes it easier," she advised as she turned and started up the stairs.

"...That's quite the novel idea," I muttered as I followed, digging into my caps as I walked. I had gotten just under four hundred from Silver's place and had spent about twenty on food at the Brass Lantern. A voice in the back of my mind told me to keep better track of my money.

A small bag landed at my feet when I entered the room. It was an awkward proposition to pick it up and pour in the fifty caps I'd already taken out of my own bag but I managed and quickly filled it up with the rest. "Good boy," Nova chuckled quietly. "Now come here before I start to feel like you don't think much of me."

I walked over to where she was standing beside the large bed silently. I couldn't look at her for much longer than a couple seconds before glancing away nervously. I was no virgin, but there was something about the idea of having sex with a complete stranger that made me shift uncomfortably under my armoured jumpsuit.

"Is this your first time?" she asked, sounding rather amused.

I shook my head and answered a simple "No." I hesitated for a moment before continuing. "It's just...every other time was with someone I actually knew, I guess. You're...well, not to offend, but you're kind of a stranger to me."

She laughed and I glanced away nervously again. She reached up and turned my chin to make me face her again. "You're sweet," she said. "Tell you what. I don't let most of my customers kiss me, but if it'll help make you a bit more comfortable, I'll make an exception for you."

"Okay," I said over the sound of blood crashing in my ears. Nova smiled again, laced her fingers through my short and messy black hair and pulled me down to kiss her. Without thinking about it my hands came to rest at her lower back, something she seemed to find amusing, judging by the way her smile grew against my lips.

The kiss started slow and downright sensual, but a combination of nervousness and excitement made me press harder against her and turn the kiss more aggressive. Still, she didn't seem to mind, and gave just as good as she got. Fingers tightened in my hair and her tongue invaded my mouth to coax mine into action.

Shaky fingers roughly unzipped her jacket and pulled it open. Her own hand mimicked the action on my jumpsuit, though she seemed somewhat disappointed to find my chest covered by a plain white tee shirt. She pulled back and pushed the jumpsuit off my shoulders. "That has to go," she gestured to the outfit hanging off my arms.

"Uh, sure," I muttered hastily and all but hopped out of the suit and my shoes. Although it was a bit of a struggle to get it off my left arm because of the Pip-Boy there. I lamented that I had never paid attention to how to actually remove the thing. It wasn't as though it just slid off.

Nova seemed to enjoy the sight of me standing before her in nothing but boxers and a tee shirt. Through the tank top beneath her jacket I could see her hardened nipples straining to get out. She followed my gaze and looked down at her breasts and a smirk split her face. She wordlessly divested herself of her jacket and shirt and seemed quite happy to reveal her lack of a bra.

"Glad you like what you see," I didn't have to look down to know what she was referring to. I could feel my erection trying desperately to break free of its cotton prison. Nova sat down on the bed and slid gracefully away from me to its opposite side. "Now how about you come and get it?"

Even though it took a moment to get my body to move, I really didn't have to be asked twice. A thought crossed my mind that I should say something witty and seductive, but then a much more powerful thought hit me that this wasn't some trashy romance novel and I'd probably just end up stumbling over words and making an ass of myself.

I didn't bother trying to make my movements seem graceful or sensual. I simply moved over to her, steadied myself on one arm and went back to kissing her. Our tongues resumed their dance as a hand calloused by years of random maintenance work gripped at her breast. She let a pleased moan out against my lips when my hand squeezed and kneaded her pliant flesh. I rolled her nipple gently between my fingers and elicited a slightly louder noise of pleasure from her.

We broke apart only long enough for her to pull my tee shirt off. I was grateful that the computer attached to my arm didn't cause any issues with it. Her fingers pressed into the muscles of my back. Nails dug into skin. The pain brought everything sharply into focus. A low growl escaped my throat and I pulled away from Nova's lips to attack her so far neglected breast with my mouth. I was surprised at the sounds I made but I was long past caring.

Heavy pants and quiet moans issued from the woman below me as I continued my assault on her breasts. I experimented constantly, always curious about which spots produced the best noises from her mouth. I learned that she enjoyed it most when I scraped my teeth along her aureola and then laved the area with gentle strokes of my tongue and when I massaged a small spot on the underside of her breast with my thumb.

"God dammit, I'm fucking soaked," she groaned and I glanced down to her fingers working at her clothed groin.

Heated lust overtook me completely and I all but threw her hand out of the way. Her panties slid down her legs with little resistance, though I left it to her to finish kicking them off when I dove into the apex of her thighs. My tongue flicked across the hard nub I found there and a finger slid into her with ease, aided greatly by the fluids nearly gushing out of her. Within seconds I had slid in another finger to join the first and was pumping them for all I was worth. "Fuck," she panted when my lips sealed around her clit and gave it a hard suck.

Despite all conscious thought having left me long since, the analytical part of my mind that I always had a hard time turning off marvelled at how neatly she had kept herself trimmed, as well as how clean she seemed to be. It stood to reason that in a post-nuclear wasteland personal hygiene wouldn't be the highest priority, but maybe that was a different story when it was this was a job. It wouldn't do to get a customer sick, after all.

I growled irritably at my own mental tangent, banishing the distracting thoughts and focusing wholeheartedly on the task at hand. Apparently I had been lost in my own head for longer than I thought since it seemed that mere seconds later I had Nova's fingers knotted tightly in my hair and holding my face so hard against her sex I thought she might intend to crush me into her. Harsh screams tore from her throat and that damned voice popped up again to tell me that others could probably hear us. I didn't care in the slightest.

She suddenly pulled me up to her face by my hair, kissing me hungrily as though desperate to taste herself on my tongue. I happily obliged, sliding the slick, tired organ into her mouth. She began to suck on it greedily. The sensation brought forth an appreciative groan that grew much louder as I felt a hand wrap tightly around my throbbing member. Evidently she had managed to remove my boxers without me noticing.

Her fist began pumping at a maddening pace. I couldn't tell if she was simply excited or genuinely wanted me to orgasm before even entering her. Regardless I had to physically grab her wrist to stop her. "I swear, if you don't fuck me right now..." she began, though her sentence was cut off by a loud moan as I began to do just that.

I slid in easily, though once inside I was almost overwhelmed by the sensation of her tight pussy wrapped around me. She felt hot and wet and unbelievably horny and it was as though her arousal seeped into me through her sex. Not that I really needed any more.

A heartbeat later I was pounding into her with reckless abandon, rushing hurriedly toward the climax her hand had nearly brought mere moments ago. It suddenly seemed impossibly far off and the analytical voice I was still trying to shut up suggested that was probably a good thing. After all, she had said that she would only tell me what I wanted to know if I showed her a good enough time. By her screwed shut eyes, open mouth and wordless screamed I assumed I was doing a satisfactory job thus far.

Assorted curses began to spill from her mouth and I could tell that she was close to reaching her second end. The walls of her heated core began to tighten rhythmically around me and a smirk split my face as a devious thought crossed my mind. I stopped suddenly, an action that took every ounce of willpower in my body to perform. Her mouth hung open as she sucked in air greedily, though her eyes quickly narrowed into a glare. She looked about ready to shout something profane at me when I resumed fucking her with all the strength I could muster. My thumb pressed into her clitoris at the same time, and a brief moment later she was enjoying another orgasm.

I was close. Incredibly close. But that voice I had been trying since the start supplied the idea of an accidental pregnancy and the thought scared me so shitless I pulled out as though she had suddenly burned me. Before I could finish myself, though, Nova pretty much tackled me down and took my hard cock into her mouth. Her hand worked my shaft as her head bobbed up and down with a speed I didn't think should be possible. The feeling was unreal and I forcefully held off my climax for as long as I could to extend the sensation. I probably lasted for about ten seconds before I was emptying myself into her mouth and throat.

I fell back onto the bed and gasped air into my burning lungs. A sticky layer of sweat covered both our bodies, though Nova's actually seemed to have started running down her neck in tiny droplets. "So, was that a good enough time?" I chuckled breathlessly and sat up with weak, shaky muscles. I watched her throat flex for a second and realized she had just swallowed the load I had shot into her mouth. "Oh, fuck," I muttered quietly and looked away.

"I can't feel my fucking legs. I'd say it was good enough," I caught her smirk out of the corner of my eye. "The password's in my pants pocket. Grab it whenever you want."

I nodded, swung my weak legs over the edge of the bed and lifted the clothing with my foot. A quick search through the pockets discovered a small slip of paper with "lotsacaps" scrawled in surprisingly neat handwriting. "That's a terrible password," I noted aloud. "Not that it surprises me. The guy's a miserly prick."

"I know," I heard Nova laugh quietly behind me, though there wasn't much humour in it. "Hey...how old are you, kid?"

I stuck the paper into a pocket of my jumpsuit and made my way up to the head of the bed to collapse next to the red-haired woman. "...Nineteen," I answered uncertainly.

"No shit?" she groaned. "I think that's a new record for me."

"As long as it isn't a record for oldest, I think you're okay." This time when she laughed, I was pleased to hear some real mirth to it.

* * *

><p>AN: Gratuitous sex? Gratuitous sex. Part of me was tempted to make this chapter longer, but that would've ruined the pacing. I'd rather start another chapter here that's more focused on real character development and plot. The sex would feel even more out of place if I tacked that onto the end of this one, I think. Does the sex feel out of place here? The story is decidedly adult. Maybe it isn't out of place (random tangents for the win). The one break from reality that I'm going to stick with is the one involving caps. The capacity for caps will rarely, if ever, be mentioned directly, because carrying 50+ gets ridiculous. Don't ask why I had that many bottlecaps on me at once. It took a long time and a lot of Stewart's root beer, which is, incidentally, the second-tastiest beverage invented by man (the first is chocolate milk, FYI). I encourage any of you readers to leave a review, either about this story or the deliciousness of chocolate milk. At the very least it will confuse the fuck out of new readers before they get here. Might even inspire someone to read the story.


	4. Chapter 3

"Oh, you're back!" Moira called out cheerily when I opened the door of her store. "Does that mean you're ready to get started on our book?"

"Turns out I have some spare time, so I guess I could get some of your research done," I shrugged. Even with the password for Moriarty's terminal I hadn't had a chance to to actually access it, yet. Until I got to that terminal and found out what I needed to know I was just as lost as when I'd first gotten to Megaton. I hoped that helping Moira out with her book might at least give me a chance to get my bearings.

"You're the greatest," she said with a face-splitting grin. "Alright. The first chapter's going to be about finding good places to scavenge food and supplies, how to deal with radiation sickness, and how to avoid hazards like landmines."

"Wait, landmines are a serious enough issue that a third of a chapter should be devoted to them?" I asked incredulously.

"They're all over the place, actually. There are plenty just kicking around that people like to pick up and put in nasty places where someone else might step on them," she sounded appalled but it did little to kill her cheery attitude. I had no idea how she could keep it going.

I shook my head in disbelief. "Well, how about I start with the food thing. That sounds pretty basic."

"Sounds good to me," Moira grinned again and pulled my left arm across the table. She completely ignored my protests to fiddle with the rudimentary map I had been making of the area. "I'm going to have to upload a real map into this thing when you get back," she frowned at me. "But for now I'll just key in the location of a place called the Super Duper Mart just east of the town. I think it used to be a grocery store before the war so it should be a good place to take a look around."

"How do you know how to work a Pip-Boy like that?" I asked. I was beginning to think I had some very serious questions for my father once I caught up to him.

"All computers are about the same, once you get down to it," she shrugged. "Besides, that thing's pretty easy to use."

"Probably because I got it when I was ten," I mumbled. I doubted she heard me. I was looking over the directions she had left me and that seemed more immediately important.

"Oh! And watch out for raiders. I've heard from the caravan merchants that there have been a bunch of them hanging around there."

"Raiders?" that got me to look up and pay attention.

"Oh yeah. I keep on forgetting you're from the Vault," she laughed, though I failed to see what was so humourous about my ignorance. "Raiders are really mean, nasty people who have a bad habit of um...doing mean, nasty things to travellers," her smile faltered. "You know, like robbing them, or...killing them..."

"So then I'll probably want to go into that place with something a bit more combat-worthy than a pistol," I guessed.

"Um...maybe," she agreed with a nervous laugh. "If you'd like, I have a hunting rifle and plenty of ammunition for it."

I gave her a quick nod. "I'll take it. And something to carry the bullets with."

Within seconds Moira had everything laid out on the counter before me. The rifle looked old and worn, but a cursory inspection showed it to be in decent condition. I knew it wouldn't be long before I needed parts for it, though. Hopefully it didn't need anything as hard to track down as the spring for my BB gun back in the Vault. The main thing I liked about the rifle, though, was the fabric carrying strap running down its underside. It wasn't as though I could just slap it on my back and make it stick.

I admired the hunting the rifle. Ever since I was a kid I had been something of a gun nut. I had read every book and watched every video available to me in the Vault to get as comprehensive a knowledge as possible of various firearms and how they operated. My father must have been concerned when he asked me why I had such a fascination with guns. "I like the mechanics," I had answered. "Guns always need to be fixed, and I like fixing things. Guns need discipline." He had very likely been more satisfied with that answer than if it had been "I'm a raving psychopath and I want to kill people."

Beside the rifle were four magazines and about fifty loose bullets in a small leather pouch on a belt. The belt had a number of other small bags and pouches that I figured would probably come in pretty handy for any small supplies I came across. "It'll be a hundred and twenty caps for the lot," she informed me cheerily.

I chuckled quietly as I dug my hand into the bag at my waist. "Is that what everything costs around here?" I didn't expect her to pick up my meaning, but it amused me regardless.

"No. Just this and Nova," she made me pause halfway to handing over her money. I thought about asking how she knew that but decided against it. Logic said it was just the result of living in a small town with only a few other people. Teenage hormones, on the other hand, were quite content to fill my head with images of a more sexual nature.

I kept my face as straight as possible as I paid for my rifle and ammo and left, Moira's "Have fun!" following me out the door. I shook my head in an attempt to clear it of my perverse thoughts.

The hot midday sun beat down on my head and back as I walked east of Megaton towards the ruins of DC. According to Moira's map the Super Duper Mart was on this side of the Potomac River, so at least I didn't have to go all the way into the hulking mess of metal and concrete on the horizon. The rifle strap on my shoulder was a comfortable weight, as was the belt at my waist loaded in ammunition. Up until then I had been keeping the pair of spare clips for my so far once-used handgun in a pocket of my jumpsuit, so I was glad to have them somewhere they wouldn't be constantly stabbing my thigh.

I shouldered the rifle as I walked to get myself used to the feel of the butt of the stock pressed into my flesh and bone. It briefly occurred to me I should probably take a couple shots at something to make sure the sights were accurate and looked around for an easy target.

As I came over a large rock I caught sight of something that looked akin to a pig I had seen in a pre-war book, though this beast was a lot uglier. Its skin was naked save for a few whiskers around its nose and horribly wrinkled. It squinted through narrow eyes as it snuffled around the ground in front of it, digging at the odd patch with a huge set of incisors that clearly marked it as a rodent.

"Damn, you're ugly," I muttered and brought my rifle to bear. I had no idea whether they were common or this was the last of its kind. The thought occurred that even if it was the last of its kind that it was still a dead species.

The first shot told me that I would in fact need to adjust my sights. It also told me that the rodent I had shot was a lot tougher than I had given it credit for. It let out a harsh, coughing yelp, turned towards me and charged. "Oh shit," I muttered. I cycled the bolt as quickly as I could and took another shot. This one impacted its head and it dropped without any further fuss. "Damn, the outside world is strange," I shook my head and cycled the bolt again.

I looked down at the sights and frowned when I realized I'd need a screwdriver to actually adjust them. Until then I'd have to aim a little to the right of whatever I wanted to shoot if it was further than about fifty feet away.

When I finally reached the Super Duper Mart I found the area in front of it occupied by a pair of what I could only assume were the raiders Moira had mentioned. "Well, lookee here," the first one, a male, called out to his female companion when he saw me. He had a baseball bat laying lazily against his shoulder and a quick inspection of the female revealed a revolver tucked in a holster at her thigh. "A lost little boy. Where'd a kid like you get a piece like that?" he laughed and motioned to my rifle. "You might hurt yourself with that thing. Better hand it over before something bad happens."

I swallowed past the anxious lump in my throat. I'd probably have to choose my next words carefully. "Or you could go fuck yourself. That might work," left my lips instead of something intelligent and life-saving.

My words earned me the woman's revolver in my face. "I don't think I like that tone of yours," she smirked.

Until that moment I didn't really know just how fast I could move. I found out that when the need arose I could grab someone's arm, hold it to the side and throw a punch across her jaw in less than a second. The strike made her jerk her arm, causing her to fire a round off into the air to the side. Some surprisingly quick-thinking part of my mind made the hand holding her wrist hit the cylinder catch and opened it, making all the remaining bullets fall out of her gun to the ground.

I looked up in time to duck and avoid the wild swinging of the man's bat. The quick evasion also had the added benefit of causing him to strike the woman and stun her, which gave me the chance to wrest the gun from her hand and toss it out of immediate reach. He spat out a curse at the blunder and wound up for another hit. I tried hopping back again but ended up slipping on one of the bullets that had fallen from the revolver.

Instinct took control of my body and time seemed to slow as adrenaline dumped into my bloodstream in full force. I didn't feel the kickback or even hear the thunderous report of my bullet as it tore from the barrel in a burst of fire and smoke.

The raider looked confused for a moment before touching a hand to the wound in his stomach. "You shot me, you little bastard," he mumbled weakly as the bat slipped from his other hand.

The female's roar caught my attention as I scrambled back to my feet. I moved only slightly too slow and received a jagged gash across my forearm from the knife in her hand. I gave a quick hiss of pain and deflected her second swing with the body of my rifle. A fast snap of the weapon cracked the stock into her face, knocking her back and giving me room to give her a proper strike with the full butt of the rifle. A sickening crunch sounded that I could only assume to be her nose breaking and she hit the ground on her back, the knife slipping from her fingers and skittering to the side.

"If I don't kill them, they'll kill me," I mumbled almost silently to myself. Another loud crack of my rifle preceded the bloody spatter around her head. I pivoted on my heel to bring the weapon to bear on the other raider. He was on his knees, something akin to a sheepish smile on his face.

"Guess we fucked with the wrong kid," he actually chuckled. I said nothing. I preferred to let my gun do the talking, and it seemed to agree with a deafening roar.

I remember seeing old pre-war movies in the Vault where people who got shot seemed to fly through the air. That isn't what happened. The back of the raider's skull simply exploded and he merely dropped backward into a pool of blood and bits of bone. One leg was bent at an awkward angle under his back and the other was twisted slightly to his side.

I frowned at the realization that this time, killing another human being truly hadn't bothered me. In fact, I actually felt rather excited from the adrenaline rush. I was only frowning because it seemed that my father had wasted nineteen years teaching me to always do whatever I could to help others. Those lessons had seemed so important back in the Vault, but now they seemed more like a dangerous liability to hang on to. I knew I needed to let go of whatever value I had on human life if I wanted to survive in this Wasteland.

With that thought in mind I retrieved the woman's holster and revolver, along with the scattered bullets and whatever spares she had on her person. It couldn't hurt to have another weapon spare. Words read in a book about gun safety and maintenance years before sprang into my head and I checked the magazine of my rifle and confirmed that it was empty. A quick inspection of the chamber, though, showed it still had a round in it, something I knew would be good to keep in mind. So long as I made sure to generally reload on the fifth shot I could avoid cycling the action for a faster reload. Any advantage in a firefight seemed useful.

I refilled my empty magazine with spare bullets, stuck it back in my rifle and reloaded the revolver. It was another comfortable weight in the new holster at my left thigh. I also picked up the knife the woman had attacked me with and its sheathe after realizing that if I ran out of bullets the only option I'd have would be to use the guns as clubs. Somehow a knife seemed a better alternative.

The weapon reminded me of my wound. I peeled back the sliced fabric and took a look at it. It wasn't deep and it had actually stopped bleeding, but concerns over infection burned in my mind. I would need to find something to clean it with soon. I thought that if I was lucky there might be something inside the building.

The door to the inside of the Super Duper Mart creaked quietly when I opened it. "You guys hear all that fucking ruckus outside?" I heard from somewhere inside the store. I quickly ducked behind a counter a little ways inside the building and out of sight.

"Probably just Sid and Josie taking shots at a few molerats or something," another voice dismissed the first.

I hazarded a glance over the counter and took in the layout of the store. Most of the shelves were knocked over on their sides or leaning against each other and the few that weren't had a simple system of wooden planks between them that I figured were simply for quicker travel across the store. Two raiders were behind a counter at the far back of the store and I could hear footsteps on the far side of the knocked over shelves. A hallway at the north end of the store lead to what appeared to be a set of washrooms and I assumed with a frown that more raiders were likely in there.

I ducked back down and gripped my rifle tightly. I had six bullets in my rifle and only three immediate threats. Even if there were more in the washrooms to the side, I could probably still drop all three in the common area and reload in time to shoot anyone who came running in. I'd have to shoot fast, though, and despite my many years with a BB gun I was still only getting used to the hunting rifle.

Still, I thought as I exhaled a calming breath, sitting with my back against a counter wasn't going to get me anywhere. I turned to a crouch and rested my elbow on the counter to keep my rifle steady. I forced myself to breath steadily to keep myself calm. The blood pounding in my ears wasn't helping.

I realized that I faced a very real possibility of dying in the next couple minutes if I didn't do things properly. Unfortunately, the more I tried to ignore that fact the harder it seemed to become to put out of my mind. My palms grew clammy as the seconds ticked by in my mind. I swore I could hear a clock ticking nearby obnoxiously loudly, but then it was probably just my own anxiety. I shut my eyes, took another deep breath, and held it when I opened them. I focused the sights on a male raider's torso. No need for fancy shots for the head. A bullet in his chest would do just as well.

The first loud crack of my rifle echoed through the store and stopped the blood in my ears cold. The floodgates broke open on my adrenaline for the second time in less than fifteen minutes and sound seemed to fade away. I was beginning to like this calm excitement, I realized. I could feel my heart pounding in my chest, but everything seemed so muffled and dull. A red spray leapt forth from the raider's barely-covered chest. Apparently he had figured no one would bother to aim around the mismatched bunch of leather and thin metal adorning his torso.

The sweat was gone from my palm when I flicked the bolt back and forth. The sound of the bullet casing hitting the ground was shockingly clear and loud. Likewise, I was perfectly aware of the noise of a fresh slug being pushed into the chamber of my rifle with the action.

The second raider didn't even seem to realize that his comrade had fallen when my bullet tore into his left shoulder. His armour was far more complete than the first's and left far less room for a clean hit. A slight adjustment put my next round in his head and bolstered my confidence considerably.

The curses of another pair of them sounded distant and unintelligible as they stormed up from the back. One was male and brandishing a rifle nearly identical to mine while the other was clearly a woman and held a pistol in his hand. I pivoted quickly and let off a shot that caught him in the throat. Of all the things to hear, I didn't know why I picked up on his pained gurgle. His rifle dropped to the ground with an audible clatter as he snapped his hands to his neck in a futile attempt to stop the bleeding.

A cash register next to me exploded when the woman began blindly firing at me in a rage with her handgun. If she had bothered to hold the gun properly and aim she may have actually hit me, but I suppose that holding a gun can make someone drunk with a false feeling of power and do foolish things. A red flower suddenly burst forth on her chest. Small bits of bone from her shattered sternum edged the fresh, clean hole now present in her body. The drop in blood pressure probably made her black out before she hit the ground.

One last raider stepped into the open; the one I had heard behind the shelves when I had entered the building. In one hand was a grenade but the other held its pin. She caught sight of me nearly instantly and wound up to throw the explosive. My sights centred on her forehead. With how I had been shooting, I was confident I could end her life before she ever threw her little package. A cold smirk split my lips when the rifle thundered to life before she threw the grenade...and took out a chunk of plaster from the wall next to her head.

Time seemed to slow to an absolute crawl. The grenade left her hand. I looked down at my rifle and realized that was my sixth bullet. I was out of ammunition. A grenade was flying at me. I had about five seconds to contemplate how badly I had just fucked up in my arrogance and desire for a fancy shot.

I stood, turned and bounded over two of the register counters next to mine. Two hundred year old wood and plastic probably weren't going to be much help against a grenade, but it was better than being right next to it. I hit the ground, dropped my rifle and curled up against the third counter. The shock wave from the explosion crashed over me and made my ears ring and my head spin. I could barely see straight enough to grab my rifle and change magazines and scarcely had the presence of mind to even save the empty.

I forced myself back into a crouching position, trying desperately to focus against the world spinning in my eyes. Dust surrounded me but I forced myself not to cough. I hoped the raider would come looking to see whether or not I was dead. A gunshot to my right barely preceded a searing pain in my arm. I spun around and fired the instant I caught sight of the woman. I saw her flinch but she when didn't immediately drop I fired again. The second bullet made her hit the ground like a sack of rocks, though the twin spots of blood on her back made me wonder if the second shot was really necessary or just a waste of ammo.

I set the rifle down on the counter next to me, figuring that if no one else was shouting or shooting at me I was probably alone in the store by now. I looked down at the weeping gash in my bicep and didn't know whether to be upset or relieved that it was in the opposite arm from my knife wound. The bullet only grazed me, though I supposed that was likely better than actually catching the round in the shoulder. The graze would need to be cleaned and bandaged and would leave a nasty scar but I'd still have the use of my arm. "Hurts like a bitch, though," I muttered to myself and slung my rifle back across my shoulder.

In just under an hour I had scoured the open areas of the place clean, including finding any ammunition the raiders had on their bodies or in various boxes around the store. The bathroom had a small number of dirty mattresses and a variety of pills, needles and inhalers that I made sure not to touch. There was no telling what kind of diseases might be present on them. I also found two refrigerators connected to a pre-war fission generator. I had to admit that I was somewhat impressed by the thing's longevity. Two hundred years couldn't have been easy on it.

Most of my time, though, was spent looking for a key to the door in the back labelled "Pharmacy". If I was going to find medical supplies for my injuries I knew they'd be in there. I would've just tried picking the lock but unfortunately I didn't have any bobby pins on my person. I personally had no idea how the trick my dad had taught me in the Vault worked. I just knew that he was forever lamenting showing his son how to flip open a lock with an everyday item. The only one I had never been able to pick was the one cleverly hidden behind the frame of his Revelation 21:6 picture.

I eventually found the key scattered amongst a bunch of mines and grenades in a small office in the back and couldn't help but think what a terrible idea that was, especially with the assortment of drugs in the bathroom/sleeping area. All it would've taken was one clumsy or high raider to fumble along for the key and more than one person probably would've been dead and the key lost. I likely should have been disturbed by the fact that only the latter possibility bothered me.

Inside the pharmacy I found a lot more than just medical supplies. Unfortunately, most of it was just junk. Random bits of scrap metal and parts were scattered on flimsy aluminum shelves. My curiosity drove me to inspect a great many of the odds and ends. It would at least be a good place to keep in mind if I ever needed to build something, I thought. Still, I did find bandages and disinfectant and even a few stimpaks and set to work on fixing myself.

I disliked the thought of using anything that wasn't sealed and sterile but I also knew I couldn't be picky. Soaking a few sections of the bandages in the disinfectant as well as covering my wounds with it put my mind a little at east. It only took a few minutes but ended up costing me both of my sleeves. I tucked the cut fabric in one of the pouches at my waist in case the suit needed repairs later and packed away as much of the medical supplies as possible.

A computer terminal in the far back of the room caught my eye. I guessed without even approaching it that it was for controlling the robot currently in stasis next to it. I toyed with the idea of trying to break into the terminal and take control of the automaton but decided against it. At the moment I figured it was best to simply get back to Moira in Megaton and tell her what I had learned.

After a quick meal of whatever unidentifiable meat was in one of the refrigerators I left the store. I saw that it was starting to darken outside and briefly wondered just how long I had actually been in the Super Duper Mart. I also realized that I had absolutely no idea when it was supposed to be day or night relative to time since I had spent my entire life underground.

The walk back to Megaton was as uneventful as the walk had been from it earlier and I spent most of my time sorting out my ammunition and supplies. The weight at my waist heavy but comfortable. It was a definite assurance of protection. Still, I was surprised by how much the sixty or so bullets I had for my hunting rifle weighed, much less the additional rounds for my automatic pistol and revolver. I also found some more empty magazines to actually keep my bullets in, though that did nothing to lessen the weight.

"You're back!" Moira exclaimed happily as I pushed open the door of her shop. "So how'd it go? Did you find any food or medicine?"

"Yeah, but securing it was less than fun," I rubbed unconsciously at the bandage around my forearm. "The raiders there didn't seem to like the idea of me taking their food."

"So they had set themselves up in a defensible position with food and supplies?"

"Yeah, but if you word it like that it might go over a few people's heads," I chuckled. "Just put down that if it's a free and open place it's great to grab supplies, and if you can get a few people together with some weapons it's a great way to keep yourselves consolidated. Personally, I'm amazed I survived. Pretty sure I should've died a couple times."

"Good thing you're such a fantastic research assistant," Moira beamed at me. I suddenly became a little uncomfortable with her grinning at me like that and scratched the back of my neck nervously.

"I got lucky, that's all," I countered. "That and the raiders weren't terribly good shots."

"Most of them aren't. They get by with numbers and intimidation," she nodded. "Still, it's great that you made it back in one piece."

"I certainly think so," I chuckled again. Even in spite of the bullets and explosives coming at me only a few hours prior, being around Moira still put me in a better mood. Her cheeriness was infectious.

Her face suddenly took on a somewhat regretful expression. "I wish I had something to give you for all your hard work," she said. "Tell you what. I'll give you a discount at my store so you can always have some supplies to help with the research."

"Uh, yeah, sure," I agreed hesitantly. A discount sounded nice. Continuing to throw myself into incredibly dangerous situations for the sake of "research" sounded less so.

She glanced over her shoulder at a clock on the wall behind her. "It's getting kind of late to keep going today, though. How about you drop by tomorrow and we can start the next part of the chapter?"

"If I have the free time, I'll stop by," I smiled back at her. Some friendly farewell chased me out the door when I left. I looked up at Moriarty's Saloon once I was outside. It was time to find my dad.

* * *

><p>AN: So I'm pretty sure I promised someone something like 7000 words to this chapter. This clocks in at somewhere around 5000. I apologize for the 2000 words short but I couldn't help but feel that it would've started dragging horribly if I'd extended this chapter that far. For once I actually got what I wanted done in this chapter. The initial seeds of the Lone Wanderer's fall from wide-eyed idealist into cold, callous cynic have been planted and he's come to terms with killing people who are a threat to him. The only thing I don't like about this chapter is I feel it's a little too...lighthearted at times. Too much comedy that isn't of the black variety. Other than that, though, I'm pretty happy with it. Let me know if you are, too, if you'd be so kind.


	5. Chapter 4

I was mentally debating whether or not the whisky in Moriarty's Saloon was 200 years old or just poorly made. Either way it burnt the back of my throat and made me look like I was actually there for a reason other than breaking into his terminal in the back and finding out where my father had gone. He was still wandering around, berating Gob about some meaningless thing while I chatted idly with a man named Jericho.

The rough looking man was one of the unofficial guards of Megaton, though he freely spoke of his past as a raider. He seemed more than happy to recount tales of past glory, or at least as close to glory as shooting whoever he pleased was. Still, he also admitted that those days were gone and at this point he just wanted to waste away his days drinking, comfortable in the knowledge that he probably wasn't going to be shot in his sleep by someone too tripped out on jet or psycho to know what they were doing. I had to get him to explain exactly what those were and he did so with no small amount of amusement.

Aside from passing time and making me appear slightly less conspicuous, the chat also gave me some useful information on raider hangouts in the surrounding area. A large part of me knew that information like that could probably end up saving my life at some point. Or, at the very least, keep me from getting too horribly perforated. The knowledge on the hazards of drug abuse was also welcome, even if I had already learned about such things from my dad in the Vault.

After a couple of hours and more drinks than I cared to count, though, Jericho called it a night and headed off with something of a stumble. I had kept my own drinking to a minimum, just enough to alleviate any suspicions about why I may be at the saloon but not quite enough to actually intoxicate me. As the night wore on it became a lot harder to really define just where that line was. Luckily Moriarty headed upstairs about the same time as Jericho had left, mumbling something about needing to count some caps in private and away from prying eyes.

I looked around the bar and saw that it had whittled down to only Gob and me. Nova was busy servicing someone in a room and anyone else had already cleared out. "Hey, Gob...you should probably step out for a smoke while you have a moment to take a break," I said calmly.

He gave me a sceptical look. "I mean, if someone were to do something in the back room and you weren't around to stop it, then it would hardly be your fault, right?" I dropped a rather heavy hint when he showed no signs of moving.

"I'd still get a bit of a beating," he said somewhat uncertainly. "...But it'd probably be worse if I were around to stop it, you're right," he finished with a quick nod before heading towards the door. He stopped with it hanging open and looked back at me. "Don't do anything stupid, kid," he warned before stepping outside.

"Like I have a choice," I muttered quietly before nearly running into Moriarty's office. The terminal was easy to find. It was simply sitting on a desk in the very back, turned on but sitting at a login screen. I quickly keyed in his stupid password and was presented with a number of files on various residents of the town. It clicked in the back of my mind that if I ever got a later chance at this, a lot of that information would probably be invaluable. As it stood, though, all I wanted was whatever Moriarty had on my father.

I opened his file and scanned over what was recorded. "GNR..." I whispered to myself. "That radio station? Why the fuck would he have gone there...?"

Before I got a chance to do any further perusing I heard heavy footsteps stomping down the metal stairs just outside that could only belong to Moriarty. My heart leaped into my throat as I hastily backtracked through all of the computer's screens until I was back at the login window.

My eyes darted around the room, looking desperately for a way out of it. I could hear the footsteps thundering ever closer to the door I had thankfully thought to close on my way in. My only option was the locked door just behind the terminal, which quite unfortunately didn't have any way of opening beyond either a key or a pick.

Praying that it worked the same way as the locks in the Vault I grabbed at a bobby pin in my pocket with sweaty, slippery fingers. My hands were shaking as they fumbled with the small band of metal and I was astounded when it didn't snap with my clumsy work. I was even more astounded when I heard the faint click of the lock sliding open. I whipped the door open with more force than I intended and only barely caught it before it slammed into the wall outside. I took a great deal more care with closing it and ran to the front of the saloon as quickly as I could.

"Shit, smoothskin. You look like you just ran all the way from DC," Gob remarked as I jogged to a stop next to him.

"I feel like it, too," I mumbled and wiped a sweaty palm across my slightly less sweaty brow. Even taking on a grocery store full of raiders hadn't terrified me that much.

Gob held out a cigarette which I very gratefully took. I had never smoked before but I had seen in books and vids in the Vault that they apparently helped ease stress. He struck a match and lit the cigarette, filling the air around me with bitter, acrid smoke. "Suck on it for a second, then inhale," he chuckled as I struggled with the thing.

I did as he said and ended up bent over in a coughing fit. The ghoul seemed to think that meant he should laugh a bit harder at my expense. "Take it a little slower than that," he said with a grin. "I take it you didn't do this much back home, eh Vaultie?"

"Not really," I said after I got my breathing back under control. I tried a much smaller drag off the cigarette and managed to actually hold it without coughing up a lung. The exhale brought forth a slight feeling of lightheadedness that I had to admit actually helped ease my concern a little.

"You got what you needed?" Gob asked after a moment.

"Yeah. One question, though," I said after another relaxing inhalation of smoke. "How do I get to GNR?"

"Galaxy News? That's in the middle of DC," the ghoul frowned at me. "You'd have to fight your way through the old subway tunnels and ruins, and that means a lot of super mutants and feral ghouls. If that's where your dad went you're gonna need a lot of ammo to get there."

I sighed dejectedly. "Figures," I muttered. I didn't know what the Hell super mutants were but they didn't sound like anything good. I made a mental note to ask Moira about them next time I saw her. "So I should probably wait a little while before trying to catch him?"

"I hate to say it, kid, but if you just came outta that Vault you're only gonna get yourself killed running into the ruins," he gave me an apologetic look and a pat on the back.

* * *

><p>It must have been at least a week after finding the password that I got called into a dark corner of the saloon by a man in a suit and sunglasses. He identified himself simply as "Mr. Burke" and had called me over for what seemed to be a very interesting proposition. "You want me to blow up Megaton?" I asked in a voice that the man sitting before me probably thought was much too loud.<p>

He frowned slightly at the question. "I'm just giving you this fusion pulse charge. What you choose to do with it is up to you. However, if you so choose to hook it up to the undetonated nuclear bomb in the middle of town and meet me at Tenpenny Tower you'll be handsomely rewarded."

Mr. Burke's every word dripped with sweetened poison, daring me to taste it and choke on my own humanity. He demanded without ever asking, instructed without ever telling. I knew that one hand was loaded in caps while the other was gripped firmly around a dagger just waiting to bite into my flesh. He even looked completely and utterly untrustworthy. His clothes were too clean, his sunglasses pale but reflective and devoid of scratches. What skin was shown outside of his pristine white pinstripe suit was clean and unscathed. The lack of any sort of flaw was entirely unnerving.

"Give me a bit to think about it. This kind of decision takes some time to decide on," I said. I hoped my tone was convincing or this could get messy a lot faster than I wanted it to.

"Of course. I'll be here once you've made up your mind," he nodded. I suppressed a shiver at the icy politeness of his voice. Wiping a settlement off the face of the Earth was simply business to him, I realized.

"Here is the pulse charge. Perhaps having it will help you come to a decision," he said as he handed me a small device. It looked like an electrical plug attached to a small box.

I nodded and left Moriarty's. Burke had only shown up in the past couple days but as far as I knew he hadn't spoken to anyone besides me. I didn't know if he'd even asked Gob for anything to drink for all the time he'd been staying there. When he finally decided to motion me over I understood why he had kept a distance. He was judging, gauging which person would be the best choice to carry out his orders. I supposed he picked me because I wasn't a local. As far as he knew I was some random wastelander hanging around the town while I caught my breath. It wasn't too far from the truth, actually.

Regardless of why he decided on me I knew I had to make him regret it. I severely doubted he'd hand the pulse charge away to someone who was undecided if it was the only one he had, and if he had more that meant he was free to ask someone else to attach it to the unexploded bomb in the centre of town. Someone who might not have the same reservations as I did about doing as he asked.

"Sheriff!" I called to Lucas Simms when I caught sight of him.

He turned at the shout and raised an eyebrow at me. "Something you need, kid?"

"I think it's more about something you'll need," I pulled the pulse charge out of my pocket. "A man named Burke in Moriarty's Saloon gave me this. He wants me to set off that bomb."

To his credit, Simms didn't look particularly shocked or concerned. "That a fact?" he asked as he took the pulse charge from my hand. "I had a bad feeling about that snake the minute I saw him. To think he actually wants to destroy the town, though..." He looked at me and motioned towards the saloon with his head. "Come on, kid. I'm gonna show you what Wasteland justice is like."

Simms walked resolutely towards Moriarty's with me in tow. I was equally interested, excited and nervous about this confrontation. Burke didn't look like much but he set off every warning bell my instincts had that he was a very dangerous person. I felt my hand drift down to rest on the grip of my handgun as we walked. The feel of rough, worn metal against my palm set my mind at ease.

Gob glanced up as we walked into the bar. He very quickly found something else to pay attention to when we made our way over to Burke's corner. The man looked up at us with a cool expression. It was obvious he had accounted for this possibility and had a plan for it. My mind instantly began running through everything I could do to make sure that I survived.

"I've decided I don't like you hanging around town," Simms said gruffly. "I'm going to have to ask you to leave."

"Of course," Burke said with the same cold politeness as everything else. "Lead the way, sheriff."

I'm not entirely sure why Lucas turned his back on Burke. Maybe he hadn't seen the pistol at the man's waist, just as I hadn't. Considering the experience he had to have had on me, though, he had to have seen the shot coming. Before the man in the suit managed to pull the trigger, though, I had his wrist twisted to the side. The suppressor on the pistol reduced the shot to a dull "thwip" that went somewhere towards the back of the saloon. I didn't have the luxury of seeing where it went as I wrested the gun out of Burke's hands.

Lucas Simms's assault rifle was much more of an attention-getter as it unloaded for several seconds into Burke's chest. The man fell back into his seat, blood quickly staining his formerly immaculate suit. "Thanks, kid. Guess I'm getting slow in my old age," he chuckled.

"Jesus Christ! Look at all that fuckin' blood!" Moriarty shouted as he came storming out from the back. "Gob! Get off yer lazy ass and get a fuckin' mop!"

The sheriff and I left the saloon. "I don't think we'll be able to keep ignoring that bomb," he muttered gruffly.

"What would disarming it be worth to you?" I asked.

He looked over his shoulder at me with a raised eyebrow. "You know how to?"

"I've learned a few things about explosives working with Moira," I nodded.

"I bet you have," he said with a wry smirk. "If you could defuse that bomb this whole town would be in your debt."

"I'll see what I can do," I said and headed down the ramp towards the centre of town.

"That's more than anyone else has done," I heard Simms say behind me. I couldn't tell if he was talking to me or himself.

I spent a few minutes inspecting the bomb, trying to avoid drawing too much attention from the people gathered around it while I figured out exactly what I had to take apart to get at the detonator. I assumed it would be in the front and found a panel that was likely used for maintenance when the bomb was manufactured. It was screwed into place and probably rusted shut, and that meant a trip to see Moira. If anyone in town had the tools I needed to take the thing apart it was her.

When I walked into Craterside Supply I found Moira tinkering around with one of the landmines I had brought her a few days prior. "You're still playing with those things?" I asked with a slight chuckle. Despite the rather stressful events of the day walking into her store always put me in a good mood. I suppose her constant smiling had to be infectious.

"Yep! I'm figuring out all the different ways I can disarm one for the book. I'm so glad you brought me so many to test," she said without looking up at me.

"Wait, so that thing's live?" I asked and quickly took a step back.

"Don't worry. I took out all the mean, exploding bits before I turned it on," she waved me off as though I were being ridiculous. "But you probably didn't come here just to watch me fiddle around with bombs. What can I do for you?"

"I need to borrow a screwdriver and a pry-bar so I can disarm that bomb in the middle of town."

That seemed to get her attention. She looked up at me with a slight frown on her face. "Those folks at the Church aren't going to like that too much."

"The Church? You mean those people who are always standing around the bomb?"

"Yeah. They call themselves the Children of Atom or something. I think they worship that bomb. They aren't going to be too happy with you if you start messing around with it."

I set my face in a grim expression. "I don't give a damn if they like it or not. Moira, someone asked me to blow it up today. They asked me to strap some kind of charge to it and wipe Megaton off the map," I folded my arms across my chest and looked her in the eye. "I refused, but what if he'd asked someone who didn't?"

Her eyes opened wide in shock. "Someone...asked you to destroy the town? Why would they do that?"

"Apparently the guy who runs Tenpenny Tower thinks it's an eyesore and that was reason enough," I let out a short sigh and shook my head. "Look, the point is I need to take the bomb apart to get rid of the detonator, and to do that I need some tools. Can you help me out?"

"Yeah..." she said somewhat numbly and bent over to pick up her toolkit. "Just bring it back after you're done, 'kay?"

"No problem," I nodded my head as I picked it up and turned to head for the door. I stopped and looked back before heading out. She looked at me quizzically for a moment when I shot her a slight smile. "Thanks, Moira." I didn't hear if she responded or not before I left. It was starting to turn into a habit.

Working on the bomb was time-consuming and felt exhausting. At the time it didn't really click for why it tired me out so much just to take out a few screws and pry the hatch off. I also wasn't paying much attention to my Pip-Boy, despite the warnings it was probably flashing at me about standing in nearly waist-deep water that was just about glowing with its radioactivity.

"What are you doing to the bomb?" one of the worshippers asked.

I carefully finished cutting through one of the wires running to the detonator just inside the panel before glancing over my shoulder. "Disarming it before it goes off and annihilates this entire place," I said sharply.

"It hasn't gone off, yet. Why would it suddenly go off now?" the man demanded angrily.

"Because someone just asked me to set it off earlier today," I answered. "I don't care if you're fine with being vaporized in a nuclear blast, but I'm not and I doubt most of the other people in this town are, either. So fuck off and let me save your lives."

"Let him work, people," Simms said as he came walking down to the town's centre. "He's working on my behalf. If you've got a problem with it, you can take it up with me."

A few of the worshippers around grumbled but turned away from the spectacle. "Thanks," I muttered as I finished cutting the last of the wires. "I just have to unscrew the brackets holding in the detonator and I'll be finished."

"That's damn good to hear," I could hear the relief in the man's voice. "You know, we've got an empty house up on that hill, across from Craterside Supply. I'd be happy to give you the key and offer you a place to live here in Megaton for what you've done for us."

The sound of the last screw falling somewhere to the bottom of the bomb sounded as I finally pulled my head completely out of the shell. The world spun as I turned to hand Simms the detonator but I tried to shake to off and ignore it. I suppose I thought it was just from being twisted at an awkward angle for nearly fifteen minutes straight. "Sounds a whole lot better than sleeping in a dead woman's house or the Super Duper Mart," I said. A wave of nausea swept over me that I did my best to ignore.

"I'll bet it does. Here's the key," Simms handed me the small piece of metal. "You alright, kid? You look a little pale."

"I'm fine," I said dismissively. "I've gotta get Moira's stuff back to her. I'll see you later, sheriff."

I brushed past him and made my way as quickly as I could up to the store. The nausea got worse in a hurry and before I knew it the whole world was spinning. By the time I opened the door my head was throbbing and I could feel the vomit in the back of my throat. "Here's your tools," it was hard to speak and even harder to lift the kit to her counter.

Moira looked up with a grateful expression that rapidly turned to a mixture of horror and excitement. "Oh my gosh! How long were you standing in that water?" she asked quickly.

"Maybe fifteen minutes," I said. My right hand pressed against my head in a futile attempt to quell my headache while my left landed on her counter to steady myself. That's when I saw the warnings flashing on the screen of my Pip-Boy. "Oh, fuck...that explains a lot."

The woman across from me guided me to sit down in a nearby chair before grabbing my arm and gently moving it to look at my miniature computer. "Six hundred and fifty rads? I'm amazed you aren't burning a hole in the floor," she bustled about, grabbing a pencil and a clipboard with a sheet of paper. I had actually forgotten about the radiation section of her book. "Tell me how you feel. I've never had a chance to actually see someone who's suffering from this extent of radiation sickness."

"Can I get a garbage can first?" I mumbled before clapping a hand over my mouth. I could feel the bile burning on my tongue. As soon as the pail was sitting before me I threw up harder than I had before in my life. No hangover compared to the feeling of radiation poisoning.

After what felt like ten minutes of vomiting – despite likely only being about a full minute – I described the nausea, headache and dizziness. A quick touch of her hand also confirmed to Moira that I was running a moderate fever. The whole time she scribbled down notes in an absolute flurry. I tried my best to keep going, but eventually I simply couldn't stop vomiting and she decided she had enough information. I don't know what the concoction she fed me was, though I could tell she was trying to explain it to me. I didn't care enough to actually listen. As soon as I knew it was going to fix what was wrong I drank down the foul tasting mixture.

Within a few minutes my stomach had settled out, my headache was gone and my fever was broken. My Pip-Boy cheerfully informed me that I was radiation sickness free. It also had a blinking message reading only "Unknown mutation detected."

"Well, at least it seems to be benign," Moira said in her usual half-full tone of voice.

"You mean I got a tumour from disarming that bomb?" I frowned at her.

"I don't think it's a tumour. Your Pip-Boy probably would've detected that. It's just some kind of benign mutation. Who knows? Maybe it'll even be good for you."

"I don't really see how any kind of mutation can be a good thing," I my frown etched itself deeper on my face.

"Every evolution has been some kind of mutation. Just look at it that way," she patted my shoulder. "In any case that about does it for the first section of the book. Let me know when you're ready to start on the second."

"What's that all about?" I knew I wasn't going to like the answer but I also knew I'd have to ask eventually.

"Injuries and wildlife, specifically about molerats and mirelurks because they're the ones most people run into."

"I don't even know what those things are..." I mumbled.

"Well, best way to find out, right?" Moira all but beamed at me. "Besides, if radiation sickness can't get you down, what chance does a little moleratty have?"

* * *

><p>AN: So I think it's been like, three months since I updated this thing. Maybe only two. I've spent way too long planning for its future, I think. Once I hit about chapter 10 or so I'll probably be away to the races. Until then...well, I've never been a writer who can keep a schedule, so I apologize for that. Hopefully the wait is at least somewhat worth it. I...don't really hate this chapter. I'm at least glad it's out of the way because there were times when it was just sitting open on my computer without anything getting written for it because I had no idea what to do with it. Then I decided on dealing with Mr. Burke and it wrote itself in about three days. And some people are probably going to hate me for killing off a character that a lot of other writers build up to be this huge bad guy in about three paragraphs but that's what he is in the game, if you take the path my LW did. On a random side note, anyone else wondering how long it's going to be before I give him a name?


	6. Chapter 5

A grimace pulled at my lips as I nudged the dead monstrosity before me with my foot. It didn't take much thought to figure out that the _thing_ I had just shot was a super mutant. If the sickly green colour of its skin or the loud, barely intelligible grunts didn't tip me off the fact that it had taken five rifle shots to bring down should. It was a mess of hulking muscle and bone and its face was twisted in a permanent scowl. "You're an ugly son of a bitch, I'll say that," I muttered to the corpse before continuing past it.

Trailing after my abandoning father had ended up being the ordeal it had been promoted as for the three weeks since I'd stumbled into Megaton. The subway tunnels were, just as Gob had predicted, filled with ghouls a lot less nice than he was. Some were dressed in rags and some in make-shift armour I had to guess they'd been wearing since they were human. Most, though, were stark naked and scrabbling in the dark like animals. It was a disturbing shift from the nice if somewhat ugly man I had met in Megaton.

Raiders hiding out in the darkness of the tunnels had proven to be somewhat troublesome, though. They seemed to know just where to set up to avoid any of the packs of ghouls populating the derelict passageways. Firearms seemed to be reserved for only a few members in each gang down below, as well. Most were only armed with improvised weapons; pieces of metal or baseball bats were commonplace. The ones with knives rarely knew how to use them properly and for that I was thankful.

Luckily I was armed for bear and my weeks in the Wasteland had sharpened my instincts, my reflexes and my aim. So far I had avoided any serious injury in the tunnels but the scars painting my arms and legs kept me wary and aware of the consequences of a lapse of focus. It hadn't taken me very long to exchange the reinforced jumpsuit Moira had given me for a real set of hardened leather armour, once I had the caps to afford it. It was stiff and uncomfortable, but I knew from experience that it was hard enough to stop a pistol round at much more than point-blank range.

I pulled my canteen from its mesh sling at my waist, unscrewed the top and took a painful swig of slightly irradiated water. Purified water was incredibly difficult to come by and each mouthful of dirty, metallic water I swallowed in the Wastes made me realize just how much of Vault 101 I had taken for granted in my life.

In the Vault I had never gone hungry or thirsty, never had to sleep on a rotted out mattress next to freshly killed corpses, and never had to shoot someone or be shot at. Some of the skills I had been taught in the Vault had proven invaluable on the surface. Fixing broken water pipes and machinery and stitching wounds had earned me a few handfuls of caps. At the same time, though, so much of what I'd learned was suddenly useless. All of the books I had ever read and everything I knew about history wasn't going to save me when a bullet was flying at my skull. In the Vault I had never been taught how to repair a rifle, or how to wrap a scarf around my face to keep a sandstorm from cutting at my cheeks, or that it's best to stick a combat knife in a man's stomach because there it doesn't get jammed like it does in the ribs.

I glanced down at the faint green glow at my wrist for the time and saw that it was just after four o'clock in the afternoon. If it weren't for the clock in my Pip-Boy I would've long since lost track of how long I had been slinking through the old, dilapidated tunnels of the Old World. It was bizarre, but the artificial lighting and cramped spaces reminded me of the place I had spent the first nineteen years of my life in. The thought sent a pang of homesickness through me and I briefly wondered if I'd be able to go back when all this was done. I couldn't imagine why I wouldn't. I hadn't had any hand in my father's disappearance or the radroach infestation. Besides, I was a skilled mechanic and a decent doctor in my own right. My utility had to outweigh whatever bias the Overseer may have had against me. And if I couldn't convince him I was sure I could convince Amata, and that was all I'd need. I was certain of it.

Any further thoughts on what was once my home were quelled when I finally came upon the gate leading to the outside world. According to the map of the subway system I had downloaded from a terminal I had stumbled across this place - the map identified it by the odd name of "Chevy Chase" - was the section of DC that had GNR. I hoped that most of the inner city was still intact. If it looked anything like the outskirts I was going to have a hard time finding my way anywhere.

I had to squint against the harsh light of the mid afternoon when I walked outside and I ignored the urge to strap the goggles hanging around my neck over my eyes. The few hours I had spent underground had done more to my eyes than I thought. When my sight adjusted I frowned at the broken rubble and ruins around me. I wasn't surprised so much as simply disappointed and frustrated. It was like the world was against me tracking down my asshole of a dad. "God dammit," I muttered to myself. I wondered faintly how I was supposed to track down GNR through a mess of broken concrete. "I won't find it by standing around here," I sighed at length and headed in the only truly accessible direction.

The streets were filled with pieces of buildings and decrepit husks of Old World vehicles. Every cracked and crumbling building, every split in the pavement beneath my feet was another scar left on the world by the Great War. Two hundred years had done little to heal the wounds, it seemed. As I looked around while I walked I understood how terrible man could be. Washington, DC, once the national capitol of the United States of America, was reduced to nothing but a ruined shell of civilization by mankind's hate and fear.

It occurred to me that it wasn't alone. All over the world were other broken cities; monuments to mankind's thirst for destruction and death. I wondered if the people who launched the bombs ever thought about the survivors. Most probably doubted that there would even be any. They willingly consigned the human race to extinction over petty quarrels made massive because the wrong people had them. The common man was made to suffer for the sins of the so-called leaders of their nations. I wondered then if the cycle would end up repeating, though that relied on humanity actually managing to pull itself back from the brink. Would our species learn from this catastrophe, or would it simply be marked as a footnote in history in a few centuries so that the new genocidal maniacs in power could pretend that they'd do better in wiping out their own kind?

Any further musing was abruptly ended when I saw a pair of super mutants round the corner of a building. They caught sight of me almost immediately. One, wielding a rifle identical to my own, let out an almost joyful shout and raised the firearm into the air. The other charged at me with a sledgehammer held fast in one of its hands.

I dashed to crouch behind a large chunk of concrete to get out of the way of the rifle-bearer. The other was on me before I had a chance to get my rifle trained on it from behind my cover. Without thinking I dropped onto my back to avoid the low swing of its weapon. The sound it made when it crashed against the concrete of my cover shook me to my core. I brought my rifle up without bothering to stand and let out a shot. It didn't catch it in the head as I had hoped but instead punctured through the beast's thick neck. What I expected to be a debilitating wound only served to fuel its anger, though.

"Puny human! You die now!" it screamed. The fact that it could speak English chilled me to the bone. Something so inhuman speaking my own language seemed horribly perverse. The sledgehammer careening down towards my head kept me from having time to dwell on it, though.

I rolled to the side and heard the handle of the sledgehammer crack from the impact on the concrete where my head had been a split second before. I raised my rifle a second time, though this time I actually lifted it to my shoulder and took aim down the sights. The sound of the bullet impacting the mutant's skull was almost as satisfying at the gory spray that leapt from the back of its skull.

"One down," I muttered as I pushed myself back to a crouching position. I shot up from my cover and instantly had my rifle aimed at the mutant across the way. I fired before it did and managed to catch it in the chest. It was enough to make its shot go wide. Or at least wide enough that it only grazed my own shoulder. I hissed against the pain, shut it out of my mind and took another shot. This one found its mark in the mutant's skull and I was grateful that their heads were so massive.

I swapped my magazine for a fresh one and let out a harsh grunt at the pain the movement caused in my fresh injury. I set my rifle down against the concrete that had likely just saved my live and set about dressing my wound. I was just tying off the bandage when movement down the street I had been walking along had my rifle back in my hands and aimed at the new arrivals.

There were two people walking down the road towards me. I recognized the power armour and energy weapons from pre-war books and comics from the Vault. I lowered my gun, knowing that if they wanted to start anything my best bet was by far to just start running and hope. There wasn't much a light rifle like mine was going to do against power armour.

"This your handiwork?" one of them asked as she approached.

I noticed that of the two she was the one without a helmet. She looked barely older than me with light blonde hair, a fair, if dirtied, complexion and hard green eyes. I couldn't deny she was attractive, but there was a coldness about her I found a little intimidating. Not that I was going to let that show.

"Yeah, it is," I answered simply.

"Not bad, for a Wastelander," she said in an almost approving tone as she looked between the corpses. "What's a kid like you doing here in the middle of DC?"

"Looking for Galaxy News," I admitted. I saw no point in lying to people who could potentially help me find the place.

"What business do you have there?"

"I'm following my dad, and that's the last place I know he was headed. I'm hoping I can find something or someone there to get me back on track."

The woman stared at me for a second and I could tell she was reading me for something. Probably trying to figure out if I'd slow her down. Eventually she gave a curt nod and motioned for me to follow. "Come on. We're heading to Galaxy News. Just don't fall behind or we'll leave you there." I nodded back in return and swiftly gathered what little ammunition the super mutant I had killed possessed.

"Ah, man. Now we've got some Wasteland kid tagging along?" one of the others, a young woman by the sound of it, gripped to her obvious superior.

"Stow it, Reddin. It's my call, not yours," the older woman said in an even tone.

"Who are you guys, anyway?" I asked after a couple minutes of silent walking.

The blonde-haired woman looked back at me sceptically. "You just crawl out from under a rock?"

"A hole in the ground, actually," I smirked when I noticed she couldn't tell if I was joking or not.

"We're knights of the Brotherhood of Steel," she answered at length. "I'm Sentinel Sarah Lyons, leader of Lyons' Pride."

"The best damn squad in the Brotherhood," Reddin chimed in. She earned herself a sharp look from Sarah and a rather bored one from me.

"No offence, but when you're walking around in power armour and hauling energy weapons it makes it kind of hard for ordinary wasters like me to compare," I said, reminding myself of the laser pistol strapped to my hip. It wasn't in very good shape and at the moment I didn't know how to fix it. I shifted the rifle strap sitting on my shoulder unconsciously.

"That's why we have to take care of you," Reddin said smugly.

"Remind me not to save you later when everything goes to shit," I shot back. Even with her helmet in the way I could tell she was scowling at me.

"If I needed you to save me I wouldn't be much of a Brotherhood Knight," she growled.

"You're still an Initiate, Reddin. Don't forget that," Sarah chimed in. "He's right; things are going to go south as soon as we hit GNR. When they do, don't do anything stupid. Just do whatever I or Vargas tell you."

"Yes, ma'am," Reddin said dejectedly as we came upon a fourth person in power armour. He was looking down the scope of his rifle, taking aim at some foe we couldn't see around the upcoming corner. The powerful rifle barked out a shot.

"Another mutant released from its torment," he muttered in a solemn tone and turned to face us as we approached. With his helmet in the way I couldn't read his expression but I imagined it was one of some surprise when he saw me. "Sentinel Lyons, I never knew you were the type to pick up strays."

"Only the ones who can drop a mutie. He has business at GNR, apparently," she said. She looked down at the corpse laying next to the other Knight and frowned. "Jennings didn't make it?"

"Afraid not," he said and turned to me. A few weeks before I would've been stunned at his unconcerned attitude with death, but as it was I understood. "Vargas headed out ahead of us a couple minutes ago to try and back GNR up."

"Then we probably shouldn't be wasting time," I suggested with a shrug. I was expecting some scolding remark in return, but instead Sarah just nodded and motioned for us to head out.

We wound our way through the broken down buildings and rubble-cluttered streets. Every so often we'd encounter a super mutant corpse, presumably killed by Vargas on his way. Much more often, though, we ran into live mutants. Between the four of us they weren't much trouble. I noticed that I was racking up a great deal more kills than Reddin. I had to wonder how someone fresh out of a Vault was a better shot than a trained soldier. I briefly wondered if whether she were actually trained. Sarah and Colvin, as the other man had identified himself, were proving to be very good with their respective weapons. Maybe Reddin was just a rare poor example of Brotherhood training.

As we made our way further along I noticed that the resistance was getting heavier and I was thankful for the travelling company. I was burning through ammunition against the mutants and I wasn't sure if I would've been able to kill them all on my own.

After clearing our way through a half-destroyed building we found ourselves in what amounted to a courtyard before a huge building. Mutants and Brotherhood soldiers were exchanging fire, and by the looks of things the soldiers were vastly outnumbered and dropping every minute. It didn't take long to figure out we were at the Galaxy News building.

"Colvin, move around to flank them on the right. Wastelander, I want you to start hitting them in the back. Reddin, you're with me," Sarah barked out orders. I considered arguing but ultimately decided she knew how to handle these beasts a lot better than I did and went about her appointed task.

My rifle bucked against my shoulder with each shot into the backs of the mutants ahead of me. I assumed my duty was more for distraction and to ease the pressure on the soldiers in front of the building and did more to simply attract attention than actually kill. My light rifle was less than suitable for doing much more than annoying a beast like a super mutant. Still, the odd shot found its way into an oversized skull and I was surprised by the body count I was beginning to build up.

I ducked below a chunk of what was once part of a building in time to hear a barrage of lead impact the other side. It seemed terribly unfair that the mutants had automatic weapons. I wished for a moment that I had grenades and that I had paid attention to where Sarah and Reddin had taken off to. I thought at that moment that perhaps they had simply abandoned me to death to make it past the mutants until I heard the telltale hiss of their laser rifles rip through the air. The concussive blasts of Colvin's sniper rifle soon joined them and I took the opportunity to poke my head out and join in the fight.

It wasn't long before the concerted crossfire actually managed to cut down the attacking mutants. With Colvin carving through their ranks on the far right, Reddin and Sarah on the left and myself and the garrisoned soldiers on either end the mutants didn't seem to know where to return fire. We had them divided and they didn't know how to deal with it. I realized that a single gun on each side was far more effective than any number on a single front with a force as stupid as the mutants. They thrived on simply ploughing through anything that stood in their way. They were much like the locusts and Old World ants I had read about in a few pre-war books in the Vault, I mused. Being flanked and surrounded wasn't something they were prepared for.

"Nice shooting," Sarah complimented as I approached. A group of Brotherhood soldiers were gathered around a fountain in the middle of the courtyard. "Reddin, Colvin, I want a sweep around the perimeter. Make sure we're secure. Vargas, I want a casualty report. I'm going to go let our Brothers inside GNR that we're clear."

The soldiers scattered, leaving me with a pair of nameless and faceless Knights by the fountain. They were inspecting the body of a fallen comrade and I saw them pull a chain from the corpse's neck. I didn't pay much attention to what it was since my attention was distracted by what I assumed was some sort of weapon next to the body. I set my rifle down next to the derelict fountain and knelt next to the curious device.

"What's this thing?" I asked them as I hefted it. It had to weigh at least twenty pounds and looked like what amounted to a pneumatic catapult with a lever as an oversized trigger.

"It's called a Fat Man," one of them explained. "And be careful with it. It launches mini-nukes."

My mind flashed with useless things learned in the Vault. World War Two, Japan, Fat Man, Little Boy, Nagasaki, Hiroshima. August sixth and ninth, nineteen forty-five. I resisted the urge to drop the thing in shock. "Mini-nukes?" I asked stupidly.

I heard one of the pair - the one who hadn't explained what the thing was - scoff with a muttered "Fucking locals."

The other simply picked up what looked like a short, fat missile and held it out to me. I recognized it as a very tiny and much cleaner version of the bomb sitting in the middle of Megaton. "One of these," he chuckled. "It rests in that cradle, you pull the lever and it throws it at whatever you're pointing the business end at. Or at least that's the plan. These things aren't all that accurate."

"Some small part of me doesn't think it needs to be," I chuckled back and held the nuke in one hand. The Fat Man itself wasn't too bad to just rest on my shoulder while I inspected the mini-nuke.

A loud rumble mingled with a roaring shout attracted our attention. I saw Reddin at the far end of the courtyard transfixed by a spray of dust and concrete. "Reddin! Get back!" I heard Vargas shout over the following crashes and roars. It seemed the target of his words was deaf to them, though.

An overturned bus erupted from the ground before the Brotherhood Initiate and in its place stood a monumental example of a super mutant. For the briefest moment all I heard was dead silence until it was shattered by the deafening crash of the bus returning to the cracked and broken pavement. "Behemoth!" someone cried. I couldn't tell who.

I supposed that I should have been awestruck by the massive beast. It held a club fashioned from a fire hydrant attached to a lamppost and had a collection of shopping carts lashed to its back. It was an immensely imposing sight and yet all I could think was how I had the fullest opportunity to save Reddin with the Fat Man on my shoulder. I had the fullest opportunity and I was _not_ going to do it. I was going to make good on my earlier word and watch her die and I felt completely vindicated. I supposed if there were time I may have even shouted something to her. "I told you I wouldn't save you."

Instead the words died in my mind as I watched the giant club slam into her side with a sickening crunch of metal and flesh and bone. Her body flopped awkwardly through the air like a rag doll sent soaring by a child's tantrum. It landed in an unceremonious heap on the ground. Twisted at inhuman angles, it was impossible to tell what was once her body and what was simply power armour that had been smashed into it.

The mutant turned its eyes on me and began its slow stalk forwards. Or perhaps it only seemed slow with the adrenaline pulsing through my veins. I could feel terror seize my heart in an icy and crushing grip and suddenly realized how hard it was to breath. For an instant I wondered why it had chosen me as its target despite the laser fire streaking through the air around me. Perhaps it didn't even feel the concerted light show the Brotherhood soldiers played across its skin and simply saw me as the nearest victim.

Instinct more than actual thought raised the Fat Man in my arms to bear on the beast. I was grateful for how simple the weapon was. One pull on the lower lever set the catapult running along its rails with the telltale hiss of gas being released from its tank. When the cradle hit the end of its track a horribly misplaced "ding" signalled the warhead's flight through the air.

The Fat Man was as accurate as it had been advertised as being, though. The nuke went wide and ended up impacting the ground a couple metres behind the lumbering beast. It didn't seem to make a difference, though. The blindingly bright light engulfed the Behemoth an instant before I had to avert my eyes for the pain. The sound was thunderous and left my ears ringing for several seconds as the smoke cleared.

The sound of crushing footsteps made it over the ringing, though, and I opened my eyes to find myself staring at the crippled but still very much alive mutant. Or at least I was staring at the club as it soared down towards me. How had it gotten so close so fast, I wondered just before diving forward and rolling between the mutant's legs. The sound of concrete exploding behind me told me that the long-since dry fountain had been formally demolished.

I felt metal and wood in my hand as I scrambled through the dust and lifted one of the automatic rifles that had been formerly used by an attacking mutant. I had no idea how many bullets were in the magazine or even if it was empty and didn't have the thinking power to wonder or care. I simply turned towards the silhouette in the dust and squeezed the trigger. When it rattled to life in my hands I pointed it down at the mutant's crippled leg where I guessed the knee was.

It seemed I guessed right since the Behemoth dropped down to land on its hands and knees. Its club fell and for a short instant I felt some measure of hope. Then it spun with shocking quickness and slammed the side of its fist into my ribs. My leather armour did little to soften the blow. Adrenaline and determination were all that kept me on my feet, though I did stumble a few paces and instinct drove me to press my hand against my injured chest. Sheer ruthlessness is what drove me to drive the barrel of my firearm through the beasts eye like a spear. I squeezed the trigger again, uncaring of the pain shooting up my arm as I tried to hold the rifle steady with one hand. The Behemoth's head exploded with the bullets tearing through it literally from the inside out. Still, I wasn't going to take any chances and I kept my hand clenched tight until the gun uttered a soft "click".

As I pulled the rifle's barrel from the monster's eye I realized my hands were shaking and I couldn't stop them. I suddenly felt weak and lightheaded and had to force my body to keep its composure. Dozens of places around my body were starting to throb in pain and it dimly occurred to me my armour had probably taken more than a couple bullets and hadn't even noticed. Adrenaline was an amazing thing. It was less than stellar when it started to wear off, though. I was certain the blood pounding in my ears was going to deafen me before too long.

I pulled the empty magazine from the rifle. It nearly slipped from my hands from the sweat coating my palms when I stuffed it into my ammo belt. I looked around for my hunting rifle. When I found it I was less than pleased to see it in pieces amidst the wreckage of what had once been GNR's fountain. I sighed and stooped down to retrieve its leather strap. I may as well get something back from the destroyed weapon.

I spent a few moments both calming down and collecting ammunition for my new assault rifle. Its last owner had clearly taken poor care of it so when my heart was still beating fairly hardly I took the time to collect a couple spares to work with and strip for parts. I also grabbed a few of the hunting rifles the mutants had been using. They were reliable and would kill most anything I ran into outside the city proper.

I approached the Brotherhood soldiers and earned myself a raised eyebrow from the blonde woman standing with them. "You missed with the Fat Man," she pointed out. I was surprised that she made no comment about the weapons in my arms.

"It isn't my fault the thing's impossible to aim," I shrugged. "...Sorry about Reddin," I said as Vargas talked to someone inside the building. I wasn't really, but I didn't figure Sarah needed to know that.

"She died honourably," she sounded contrived. I couldn't blame her. Reddin had actually died like an idiot just because she didn't know how to duck.

"So you taking any recruits to replace her?" I asked while we walked towards the building's doors.

She paused for a moment before shaking her head. "You can handle your own; I'll give you that. We don't take just any Wastelander, though, and even if we did it isn't my call."

Just any Wastelander? I wanted to laugh. I wasn't some two-bit raider just out to be a pain in the ass. When I thought about it, though, I also realized that doing something like joining up with the Brotherhood would probably get in the way of finding my stupid father, and as much as he may have lost some favour with me I still wanted to track his ass down. "Whatever," I answered with another shrug.

I heard a click emanate from the door that I assumed was a lock being opened. "You're here to talk to Three Dog, right?" Sarah asked as we walked in.

"If he's the guy in charge, yeah," I nodded.

"Then here's where we part ways. I have to see to my men. Take care of yourself, kid," she said with a short nod back.

I dropped the guns off at a table on the way and headed further inside. There weren't many ways to go; most of the doors had been blocked off by collapsed ceilings and overturned furniture. I eventually came to the top of a staircase and found a man sitting at a desk with what looked like a the intercom station from back in the Vault. He was wearing a pair of headphones and speaking into a microphone, though I had missed whatever the start of his speech was. "...Has gone quiet. The locals haven't come out to trade with the caravans in several days. So if you find yourself over by Grayditch, stick your head in and see what's what," he finished.

He suddenly seemed to notice me standing behind him and spun around. A smirk pulled across his lips when he caught sight of me. "Until next time, this is Three Dog," he said with a short mock howl, "now here's some music, courtesy of Billie Holiday." He put the microphone down, pulled off the headphones and stood up to walk over to greet me. He looked a bit younger than my father, judging from the flecks of grey in his hair. "Well now, it isn't too often I see a new face around here. I know what you're thinking: who the Hell is this guy and why should I give a damn, right?"

"From what I've heard you're Three Dog, the guy who runs this place, and I give a damn because there's a good chance my father stopped in here recently," I answered.

I could almost see the lightbulb in the man's head flicker on. "So you're James's kid. He said something about a son. Shouldn't you be back in that Vault?"

"As far as he's concerned, probably," I frowned. "Did he say where he was going after leaving here?"

Three Dog took on an apologetic look and I instantly knew there was a job I was going to have to do. "Look, kid. I'd love to help you find your dad. But Galaxy News...she's hurting," he stopped when I raised my hand to quiet him. He actually looked surprised that someone hadn't let him go off on a story.

I wasn't in the mood for stories or speeches. I knew what was coming and didn't feel like waiting longer than I had to. "Save me the bullshit. Just tell me what I have to do to get the information I need to track down the son-of-a-bitch."

* * *

><p>AN: ...I really need to stop ignoring this. On the bright side, it hasn't quite been two months since the last update and I have a good idea of what direction this story is going to start moving in. And I know I promised dark a while ago and I really will deliver on that. It just takes an unfortunate amount of time to setup. Especially when it's being written for free.


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